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How to find a deleted message thread in an older iPhone backup

You deleted a conversation in Messages and now you need it back. If it was deleted recently, your iPhone may still have it. If not, a backup on your Mac made before you deleted it may still hold the whole thread.

Quick answer First look in Recently Deleted in Messages: you can recover what you deleted in the last 30 to 40 days. If the thread isn't there, check that your messages were in your Mac backups at all: messages stored in iCloud aren't in a Mac backup. If they were, archive the backup from before you deleted the thread so a new backup doesn't replace it, then restore it to an iPhone in Finder. Restoring sets up the whole iPhone from that backup, so use a spare iPhone, or back up your current one first.

Step 1: Look in Recently Deleted

On iOS 16 or later, Messages keeps what you delete for a while.

  1. In Messages, tap the Filters button on the conversations page. If you use iOS 18, tap Edit instead.
  2. Tap Recently Deleted.
  3. Choose the conversations you want back, then tap Recover.
  4. Tap Recover Message, or Recover [Number] Messages.

You can only recover what you deleted within the last 30 to 40 days. A message deleted before the iPhone was updated to iOS 16 can't be recovered this way.

Step 2: Check that your messages are in your backups

A backup made with your Mac holds almost all of your iPhone's data, but not data that's already synced and stored in iCloud, such as iMessages and SMS and MMS messages. With Messages in iCloud turned on, your messages are stored in iCloud.

To see whether it's on: on your iPhone, open Settings, tap your name, tap iCloud, tap See All (or Show All), then tap Messages in iCloud. On iOS 16 to 17.1, it's called Messages.

Step 3: Find a backup from before you deleted it

  1. Connect your iPhone to your Mac and select it in the Finder sidebar. If asked, tap Trust on the iPhone and enter its passcode.
  2. In the General tab, click Manage Backups.

You'll see the backups on this Mac. You need one from before the day you deleted the thread. If it's encrypted, find its password: you need it to restore the backup.

Step 4: Archive that backup before anything else

A new backup can replace the one you want. Apple's advice is to archive a backup you want to keep, so later backups don't replace it:

  1. In Manage Backups, right-click the backup.
  2. Choose Archive.
  3. Click OK.

Do this before you click Back Up Now for this iPhone, and before any other backup of it to this Mac.

Step 5: Restore it to an iPhone

Restoring sets up the whole iPhone from the backup. You can't pick only one conversation, and what's on the iPhone now, including messages you've had since, is replaced.

Then:

  1. Connect the iPhone to your Mac with a cable and select it in the Finder sidebar.
  2. In the General tab, click Restore Backup.
  3. From the Backup menu, choose the archived backup, then click Restore.
  4. If the backup is encrypted, enter its password.
  5. Keep the iPhone connected to your Mac while it restarts and syncs.

When it's done, open Messages on that iPhone and look for the thread.

Step 6: Put your iPhone back

If you used your current iPhone, restore the backup you made with Back Up Now in Step 5, the same way, once you have what you needed from the thread.

An easier way to the same thread

The restore route works, but it ties up an iPhone, and you have to undo it afterward. An app that reads backups directly skips the restore: you open the backup on your Mac and read the thread there.

That's what Mirivilo does. In a device's Browse tab, choose a day, then open Messages: conversations on the left, the whole thread on the right, with the day each message was sent and pictures in the conversation. The iPhone doesn't need to be connected.

Messages stored in iCloud aren't in a Mac backup, the same as above.

Updated November 2026